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Thursday, 19 June 2014

Second birthday

Today marks the 6th anniversary of Sunny's major surgery. For privacy reasons I am not going to disclose what kind of surgery it was. All I can say is that it lasted six hours, that Sunny lost a lot of blood, that two surgeons were needed, that it affected a very sensitive area of his body, that he spent four days in the ICU afterwards and another three days in the regular hospital ward, that I had never heard of a surgery like that before (but later met other kids that had the same surgery and that it is not as rare as I thought - but still something most people never heard of before), and that it scared the hell out of me.

I will never forget how I carried him all the way through the hospital in my arms until we reached the patient air lock. I tried to be strong so that Sunny would not be scared but I failed miserably and cried. He started to get upset, too. Then the anaesthesiologist approached us and gave Sunny his sedative. Within two seconds he got completely limp and heavy in my arms. I was not prepared for it happening that quickly and I was almost convinced that he had died that very second. It sounds completely ridiculous writing it now but at that time I did not think, I just felt his body become heavy and limp and switched into panic mode. The anaesthesiologist said "we need your child now" but I could not give him away. He repeated "we need your child now" over and over again several times until he finally took him out of my arms and softly placed him on his bed. I will never forget the sight of his legs dangling lifeless in the air when he took him out of my arms. A second person lifted them up while they lay him down. Then the air lock closed and I fell into my husband's arms and cried hot tears.

The minutes turned into hours until we were finally told that the surgery was over and that he was brought to the ICU. We had to wait another hour until everything was in place there and we could finally visit him. I will never forget the moment when I saw him again after his surgery. I was so glad he was alive!!! He looked so beautiful and peaceful because he was still asleep.

I will never forget this date and although the surgery was not life-threatening it was a very difficult, scary one. I will be forever grateful that everything went well and I celebrate this date every year. This year is no exception. Here's to Sunny's successful surgery!